...afterwards I was flipping around and saw that HBOComedy was showing yet another George Carlin routine - but this one was from 1978. It's funny - Carlin's got this reputation as being a really filthy comedian - at least, that's what I had been brought up thinking, even though my own parents took me to see him perform when I was probably 13 or 14 - but the truth of the matter is that when you come right down to it, he's really just a linguist. His entire comedy routine - and I'm talking about his ENTIRE body of work - is fundamentally about the foibles of the English language. What was really interesting is that this particular show ended with an updated version of his infamous "Seven Dirty Words" bit. In 1978 you can just imagine how controversial this material is - the audience titters and squeals with every "motherfucker" or "cocksucker" or whathaveyou - and then I think about how tame this same routine would be today - even though it's still true.
Kicking Television
...afterwards I was flipping around and saw that HBOComedy was showing yet another George Carlin routine - but this one was from 1978. It's funny - Carlin's got this reputation as being a really filthy comedian - at least, that's what I had been brought up thinking, even though my own parents took me to see him perform when I was probably 13 or 14 - but the truth of the matter is that when you come right down to it, he's really just a linguist. His entire comedy routine - and I'm talking about his ENTIRE body of work - is fundamentally about the foibles of the English language. What was really interesting is that this particular show ended with an updated version of his infamous "Seven Dirty Words" bit. In 1978 you can just imagine how controversial this material is - the audience titters and squeals with every "motherfucker" or "cocksucker" or whathaveyou - and then I think about how tame this same routine would be today - even though it's still true.
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Farewell, LJ
So I guess I'm retiring this blog. Part of me feels like I need to make some sort of eulogy or something; part of me just wants to move on already.…
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Catching up
The first sentence of this post was "Finally, some breathing room," and then as I was in the middle of the second sentence I got handed…
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(no subject)
Kinda hard to imagine Thomas Pynchon (and not, say, Tom Robbins) writing this paragraph, but there it is on p. 99 of "Inherent Vice":…
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